Best Current Sci-Fi/Drama/Horror Show to Make Into an RPG?

flyingmice · May 27, 2017, 06:02:40 PM

Quote from: jeff37923;964623The Expanse, but it used to be an online Traveller campaign before it became a series of novels and a TV series.

It was actually a D20 Modern game, not Traveller. Played over the internet IIRC.

Voros · May 27, 2017, 07:18:16 PM

Legion is an interesting twist on supers. It is set in a kind of neo-60s near future setting.

The Brit series Utopia would be an interesting paranoid spy game.

TrippyHippy · May 27, 2017, 09:34:54 PM

Actually, I am surprised in some ways that nobody has ever tried to do an Apocalypse World type of game for Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels. Or maybe some sort of soap-opera.

Dumarest · May 27, 2017, 09:55:42 PM

Lots of shows on here I need to Google as I've never even heard of them. That's what I get for watching almost no television these days.

Omega · May 27, 2017, 10:49:54 PM

Way back we ran a Quatermass campaign using Beyond the Supernatural with the magic and psi powers mostly removed from human hands.

As mentioned before. Did Space:1999 using Gamma World and later Star Frontiers.

While not SF or Horror, Dragon Magazine had an article or two on converting Top Secret to Man from UNCLE.

Theres another Dragon article inspired by the movie Valley of Gwangi using Boot Hill. And a later issue of Space Gamer did much the same with Boot Hill and Wild West and featured more dinos. Also inspired by Gwangi and other lost world movies.

Dumarest · May 28, 2017, 10:16:07 AM

Quote from: Omega;964762Way back we ran a Quatermass campaign using Beyond the Supernatural with the magic and psi powers mostly removed from human hands.

As mentioned before. Did Space:1999 using Gamma World and later Star Frontiers.

While not SF or Horror, Dragon Magazine had an article or two on converting Top Secret to Man from UNCLE.

Theres another Dragon article inspired by the movie Valley of Gwangi using Boot Hill. And a later issue of Space Gamer did much the same with Boot Hill and Wild West and featured more dinos. Also inspired by Gwangi and other lost world movies.

I'm pretty sure none of those shows are "current," although they sound like fun games. I did a Man from UNCLE sort of game using James Bond 007, but changed the organization from UNCLE as the PCs had to be from Western allied nations as the Russians were generally on the other side. There was also a THRUSH-type organization, but one thing I found tiresome in the TV show was THRUSH nearly always being the opponent. Opening it up to include the Soviets, Red China, Cuba, and so on, gave us a lot more variety.

jeff37923 · May 28, 2017, 10:42:59 AM

Quote from: flyingmice;964709It was actually a D20 Modern game, not Traveller. Played over the internet IIRC.

Are you sure? That accelerate burn, flipover, decelerate burn is pretty uniquely Traveller.

Lynn · May 28, 2017, 02:27:13 PM

Too many good ones, but one someone hasn't mentioned is Fortitude.

Voros · May 28, 2017, 04:41:34 PM

Quote from: kobayashi;964649Taboo would make a nice historical campaign at least (and a very cool Into the Odd campaign).

Excellent idea, I'm watching it now and its fascinating. Penny Dreadful could be fun using the same engine I think. A clear antagonist to play against as well, Dracula and the Devil himself.

Hannibal would also have promise, probably best to have the GM play Hannibal though.

Joey2k · May 28, 2017, 06:54:25 PM

The 100 seems like a good choice. Several factions/tribes, plus the potential for many others, lots to explore while allowing for the familiar, post nuclear mutant weirdness (although they have backed off from that in later seasons).

The Colony also has possibilities. While the LA bloc is getting a little worn, anything could be going on outside, including lawless urban wastes and a potentially thriving resistance movement in the wilderness, and the aliens are everywhere. I see this as a near future version of the Midnight 3E setting (with even less hope).

crkrueger · May 28, 2017, 07:15:19 PM

Quote from: jeff37923;964848Are you sure? That accelerate burn, flipover, decelerate burn is pretty uniquely Traveller.

Star Frontiers did that too (it's how they got gravity), and d20 Modern pulled some SF stuff in, maybe that's where they got it.

flyingmice · May 28, 2017, 08:28:37 PM

Quote from: jeff37923;964848Are you sure? That accelerate burn, flipover, decelerate burn is pretty uniquely Traveller.

That is in Traveller because it's how spaceflight works. You burn and accelerate in one direction , then flip and burn in the other direction to cancel your speed. Now, you burn, coast, flip, coast, burn. In Traveller - and The Expanse - you have constant acceleration engines so there is no coasting. You just go faster and faster until you flip and start going slower and slower. It's science.

flyingmice · May 28, 2017, 09:14:12 PM

Quote from: CRKrueger;964934Star Frontiers did that too (it's how they got gravity), and d20 Modern pulled some SF stuff in, maybe that's where they got it.

Star Frontiers was after Traveller. I got Traveller the year it was released in 1977. while I got Star Frontiers when it was released in 1983. They all do this because that's how reaction engines work.

DocJones · May 28, 2017, 09:26:17 PM

Orphan Black. It would be a solo campaign where one would play all the characters.

Skarg · May 29, 2017, 12:27:08 PM

Quote from: DocJones;964963Orphan Black. It would be a solo campaign where one would play all the characters.

Seems to me that you'd want different players to separate knowledge, and it would involve a lot of split "party" play. Clones don't have that many similarities and don't have telepathic links. Like Sense8, it would also want to be set up to allow various things that are actually going on to discover, instead of just having the background in the show, because much of the show is about figuring out and being surprised by what is going on.